Inside the Phillies with MLB.com beat writer Todd Zolecki

Kendrick Optioned, Carpenter Recalled

The Phillies optioned Kyle Kendrick to Triple-A Lehigh Valley, and recalled Andrew Carpenter to take his place on the 25-man roster.

Carpenter is 7-6 with a 3.41 ERA in 18 starts this season with the IronPigs.

It is possible Carpenter takes Kendrick’s place in the rotation. But here’s another possibility: the Phillies make Carpenter a long man in the bullpen until J.A. Happ rejoins the rotation in five days.

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This was the last thing I expected, but the perfromance by Kendrick last night was the worst all season. He flat out quit in that fifth inning and was throwing batting practice. Where was Dubee when all that was going on? He should have been out of the game as soon as he threw that meatball to Pujols.

A total surprise! Kendrick has been awful at times, but he’s also had some decent outings. One of the frustrating parts about his game last night was that he kept throwing 1st pitch balls instead of strikes. Also Happ hasn’t exactly been burning up the diamond in LV.

phan: Not so fast. Happ is scheduled to pitch tonight (Tuesday) which would bring him back on Saturday on short rest. I don’t think that’s the plan. The game is in a rain delay, so if they move him to Wednesday, it’s really off.
Amaro said they are looking from within and outside the organization for help.

It tells you a lot about how they feel about Kendrick that they would send him to AAA without anyone to take his place in the rotation. They’d rather be stuck for an arm than to use him again on Saturday.

Now, they’re in a position where they need to make a deal. Sounds like they’ve painted themselves into a bit of a corner, and not the way a defending NL Champion should be doing business. It’s a strange turn of events.

Looks like Carpenter is being thrust into the “mop up” role sooner than we expected. With Moyer injured, it doesn’t bode well for the squad. Suddenly, Kendrick is looking like a viable option again.
Amaro’s trade calls to other GMs will be met with derisive laughter.
This is one pathetic season.

If there was ever any doubt about Danys Baez, he certainly clarified that for us tonight. As if 3 runs against Chris Carpenter wasn’t already an insurmountable task….. This guy’s WHIP must be the worst among relief pitchers in MLB. Who could be worse? The sad thing is that he has NO injury to blame for his year. Kendrick must be able to pitch out of the pen better than Baez. They dumped Adam Eatons contract worth $18-20 million. Why are they so adamant to keep a guy who is at least as bad as Lidge was last year, pitching under WAY LESS pressure in the middle innings?

The article by Bob Ford is hysterical. Moyer is 47 and just blew out his elbow. No room in the budget for any realistic trade and the pennant runs through Philly. HAHAHAHA. The Phillies are sinking like a rock in a lake and the Braves are playing the “beautiful game”. The Braves are 17 games over .500 the Phillies are 3. The Braves have the best NL record, the Cheese steaks, not so much. Utley is history, your trying to trade Werth. Howard is having an off year and your pitching is a shambles. I am frankly more worried about the Mutts mounting a charge than the fillies. The Braves have a better starting staff, better bullpen, play better defense, have a higher OBP, score the same amount of runs and allow way fewer. The fillies may be their own worst enemy, but they aren’t even on the Braves radar screen any more. We are playing for home field advantage now. You might want to start thinking how to retool for a wild card chase.

billreef: Who is this “we” you speak of? Are you a member of the Braves or just one of their fraud fans who can’t even sell-out a home playoff game (when you had them).
Statistically, Howard is right there with Pujols. I suppose he’s “having an off year” too?
By the looks of my calendar, it’s July 21, and there is still a lot of baseball to be played. The Phillies (spelled correctly) are only mathematically eliminated in your mind.
I’d suggest expanding your radar screen, and learn the difference between “your” and “you’re.”
Crawl back under your rock with your wife-beating manager and your dopey Tomahawk Chop.

If the Phillies don’t win the division and can get the wild card, I hope they get to play the Braves in the NLCS. I could get airfare to Atlanta, get a hotel room, walk up the day of the game to get a ticket, and it would be cheaper than trying to get a ticket for a game in Philly.

Yeah, I imagine the Filly fans are really hungry for playoff baseball. It’s kind of like finding a rare gem. It just doesn’t happen that often. Don’t the Fillys have the worst record all time in the history of baseball? It ATL we get in so often it’s kind of easy to get tickets for those lower round events like LDS and LCS.

Bill: when was the last time you were in the post season? Oh, that’s right, we’ve been their last year, the year before that, the year before that…….and, hate to break it to you, but we’ll be there again this year and you won’t be. Even if we don’t win the division, the Mutts will before you do. Hell, even the Nats will win before you guys can….oh yeah, and the worst winning percentage in post season….must be you guys, 10 aperences and only 1 WS to write home about……

phan: Of course Happ is “a possibility,” but I think the reason Happ was pulled was to save him for an upcoming trade rather than a potential start on Saturday. Otherwise, why wouldn’t he have been recalled already? Time will tell which one of the “balls in the air” lands.

Happ wasnt recalled already because he wasn’t pitching the way they wanted. There was no reason to bring him up if he wasn’t getting anybody out in AAA.
He’s been off the DL for weeks, but it’s just in his last two appearances that he started to pitch with the velocity they want.

So, if Happ isn’t getting anybody out in AAA, why would they bring him up to pitch on Saturday? My point is that they would have added him to the roster if they were planning on using him. I suspect he will be part of a trade, if one is made.
Meanwhile, they are 3/4 of the way through the game tonight and have scored only 1 run. How is better pitching going to help?

Pitching always helps. But this team is just sleepwalking so maybe there is no point. Maybe they should start selling and think of 2011. That little streak they had against the Reds fooled them into thinking otherwise but this is who they are. It’s been going on for too long to think that they are going to break out of it anytime soon.
Rookies and selected veterans in five days.

Moyer headed to the DL, so Kendrick will be back. All the talk from mgmt is about pitching, but who watches this team and think pitching is the underlying problem? Yeah, it could be better, but no amount of pitching can overcome such a dismal offense. Look at tonight, even if Blanton wasn’t left in too long, the team didn’t score more than 1 run so there was no chance to win.

If their starting pitching hadn’t performed the way they did in the first half it would have been even worse. This team was built generally around the everyday lineup and this isn’t the way it was supposed to happen; epic slumps by everybody outside of Polanco and Howard. But you always need pitching.

Billreef, you and your fellow Brave fans are such turkeys. What did the Braves manage to squeeze out of a HOF pitching staff, one WS. Divisions and pennants don’t mean squat, it’s the WS which counts. We can all be thankful that Cox stuck around for another year since it means no more WS flags flying over Atlanta.

I just read in today’s Inquirer that Domonic Brown has been playing left field the past couple of days. Read into that what you will.

tick … tick … tick … tick. Paging Ruben Amaro.

A friend recently asked me if I had “given up” yet. I told him that I’d be close to giving up if the Marlin passed the Phils in the NL East. They’re only 2 games apart, with Josh Johnson on the mound today.

Opponents are batting .235 against Blanton from innings 1 through 4. They are batting .321 against him in the 5th inning, 407 in the 6th and .457 in the 7th, provided he gets that far. He goes downhill quickly. When they brought him here, they told us he was an “innings eater.” He’s eating innings all right!

The guy is a complete clown, pherris. A little history lesson…It’s been 5 years since the Braves have actually been in the playoffs. It’s been 9 years since they actually won a single playoff series. It’s been 11 years since they actually played in a WS. And it’s been 15 years since they actually won one. And he thinks it’s the Phillies phans who are hungry for playoff baseball?
Now that I think about it, he is probably right. Since Braves fans don’t show up for playoff games, Philies phans ARE more hungry. Braves fans don’t even care.

Charlie really blew it last night with Blanton, muleman. The fact that he didn’t pinch hit for him in the top of the 7th with the bases loaded was mind-boggling. I know he doesn’t trust his bullpen, but he really had no choice. It wasn’t even a gamble, it was common sense. I couldn’t tell whether Wheels agreed with him or was just explaining the rationale, but there was no rationale. It was irrational.

Charlie’s post-game rationale was the age-old lefty-righty deal. He claims to only have the option of Valdez, who can’t hit, and a slew of lefties. any left-hander against a left-handed pitcher is better than a pitcher hitting.
If they were 10 games up it might not matter – let Blanton pitch. But they’re desparate for a win and regardless of any match-up issues, you have to make a move.
Plus, I’m not sure Charlie trusts his bullpen, which is a valid point.

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